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UK ready to send more troops to Afghanistan

Britain is prepared to send more troops to Afghanistan, the head of the British Army said in an interview published Friday.

Richard Dannatt, the chief of the general staff, did not say how many troops he would be prepared to deploy. Britain currently has 8,300 troops in Afghanistan. Dannatt told The Times newspaper that elements of the 12th Mechanized Brigade had been “earmarked for Afghanistan.” He said there are no plans to send the whole brigade of 4,000 troops. “If we’re asked for more and we say we can, it’s not going to be 4,000 — it’s going to be something in between” that and the current troop level, Dannatt told the Times. The Ministry of Defense confirmed his remark. British defense sources told The Times that a rise of 1,700 to 2,000 was “the uppermost ceiling.”

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